A DYING WISH
Ben Butler sacrificed his dreams to care for his mother, but is now determined to realise them, writes Elliot Worsell
FIGHTERS are often asked to explain the motivation behind their desire to punch other human beings in the head and body. Some fighters, you learn, fight because it’s all they know, some fight purely for money, some fight because doing so brings them attention and fame, some fight because they are selfish and hate team sports, and some fight because – whisper it quietly – they actually enjoy fighting people.
For Brighton’s Ben Butler, however, there is a different, deeper motivation that gets him out of bed in the morning and focuses his attention on winning titles. For Butler, it’s not about wealth, stardom or an entourage of cheerleaders. It’s not even about titles or trophies.
Instead, what drives this 26-year-old is a promise he made to his mother, Rosie (a nickname given to her as a child on account of her rosy cheeks), on December 21, 2016, two days before she slipped into a coma.
It was, on the face of it, a day like any other. Ben visited Martlets Hospice in Hove, bought a coffee named after his mother (a ‘Rosie’), a cappuccino with whipped cream on top, and took the drink to her room. He then sat down and asked her how she felt.
“Ben, you can’t keep coming here,” his mother, fighting cancer, told him. “Go back to the gym and box again.”
“I can’t go back to the gym,” he said.
Butler, a 2-0 middleweight who had effectively retired from boxing in order to care for his ailing mother and look after the family, knew that returning to the gym would drag him away from the hospital twice a day, five or six times a week.
“I wouldn’t be able to see you,” he explained. “I’ve then got work on top of that.”
“Well, promise me one thing then,” Rosie, real name Denise, said. “When it’s all done, promise me you’ll go back to the gym and box again.”
Butler promised.
Two days later, Rosie was in a coma. Within a week, she had passed away. She was just 45 years of age.
“I wasn’t going to go back [to boxing],” Butler tells Boxing News. “But after she had that last little trick up her sleeve, it gave me more determination and willpower than ever before. I came back and had three fights, got three wins, and it has changed my life.”
Butler is now 5-0 as a professional and recently spent a number of weeks sparring Chris Eubank Jnr. He called the experience “priceless”. He also continues to work as a bricklayer, aware of the need for regular income, and feels no way about juggling the two.
“I’m fighting for everything,” he says, “so it means more to me than most. You have these amateurs who win titles and then get fed to promoters who pay for everything and make their journey as smooth as possible. But I have to graft for everything and I’m happy to do that.
‘I’M FIGHTING FOR EVERYTHING SO IT MEANS MORE TO ME THAN MOST’
‘I HAPPEN TO HAVE A HOBBY WHERE I GET SMASHED IN THE FACE’
“Even though I’ve got my own bricklaying company, my father-in-law said to me, ‘Don’t let this opportunity pass you by. Come work for me, do all my brick work for me, and any opportunity you get along the way, go for it.’
“It’s quite flexible. People ask me, ‘How can you balance training and working?’ But I’ve done it before. I’m used to it. It takes a lot of energy from me and sometimes I think if I had extra time and energy I might be getting places a little quicker, but this is reality. I’ve got to go the hard route.
“Also, there are many fighters who have to work alongside their boxing career. I consider bricklaying to be my job; I just happen to have a hobby where I get smashed in the face.”
Ben Butler might view boxing as a hobby at this point, but he knows all
there is to know about fighting. He knows what it means to hang on, dig deep and persevere when everyone around you is telling you to stop. He knows what it means to suffer and endure. He knows pain.
He knows this, of course, because he witnessed Rosie, his mother, fight harder and for longer than any boxer he’s ever likely to encounter.
“My mother was everything to me,” he says. “My father was not a nice man growing up; he was a very violent man. All we had was our mum. So, when she passed away, it left a big void. I felt so lonely.
“Boxing helped me, though. It’s like in the Rocky movie when Rocky turns around and Adrian says to him, ‘Win.’ Now my whole life has been channelled into boxing. I’m up every morning running before work and then, once work is done, I’m down the gym training for an hour or two. I don’t drink. I live clean.
“My whole attitude towards boxing is do-or-die. My mother never wanted to give up or quit, so I have to do the same. I have to pursue my dream. When she told me to box again, I thought, right, I’m going to give it five years, give it all I’ve got, and see where we end up.
“But I know what’s going to happen. It’s very clear in my head. I see myself with belts in the future.”
In Rocky III, Adrian also told Rocky, “You gotta want to do it for the right reasons. Not for the guilt over Mickey, not for the people, not for the title, not for money or me, but for you. Just you. Just you alone.”
If Rosie was afforded the time, she may well have said the same. (Butler takes on Geiboord Omier in a six-rounder at Portsmouth’s Mountbatten Centre on February 24.)